A few years ago, there was a day that marked one year since my last period. It’s memorialized on the calendar with a series of red Sharpie exclamation points. Prior to this anniversary, I imagined it would be special. A celebration, maybe, a shedding of shackles and a popping of corks. I kept a bottle of better-than-everyday bubbles in the back fridge for months, just in case I made it to 12. I’d seen a bloodless four months before and, once, five — but, always, it returned. I stopped counting for awhile, assuming I’d be stuck in a loop of hormones forever. Or until death, at least.
The fantasy was a party, of sorts. Champagne and sugar, snappy appetizers, and croony tunes. A slinky new dress, or a cashmere wrap. Comfort and minor decadence. Nothing shouty, just a big fat celebratory sigh of relief.
The reality was a gray January day, quiet and boring in just the right way. By the time I made it to day 365, stealth seemed the best approach. A sneaky tiptoe past the monster that had finally slept for one whole year.
🦋
Menopause is defined as the end of menstrual periods for 12 consecutive months. It is the end of fertility, the end of the childbearing years.
I memorized this verse long ago, when it became clear that things were changing. It seems straightforward, but it’s not. I stewed in the brine of perimenopause for a decade, and have written and talked extensively about it, because writing and talking are how I manage my shit. Now, I’m officially menopausal — or postmenopausal. The end, as the definition helpfully indicates. I limped over the arbitrary line drawn by the professionals — 365 bloodless days. I felt relief, certainly, but the celebratory vibe was missing. It was rough and, at the end of it, I was tired. I wanted to curl up and recover. Out with a whimper, as it were.
I foolishly thought the day would be like punctuation. A period, or at least a semicolon. Through all those years of flashing, spinning, and struggling, I imagined a divider, like a Japanese screen or even a brick wall, between perimenopausal hell and an imagined postmenopausal calm. I was told a tale of before and after, a lie about then and now. The tellers, as it turns out, were men.
🦋
The language of menopause is vague and confusing. When we say “menopause,” we reference an end. The end of bleeding, the end of fertility, and the end of childbearing years. Everything before this day (one day!) is peri, everything after is post. It’s like the concept of time and the idea that there really is no present. Only past and future. The present is a construct — like menopause. Day 366 felt no different from day 365 and, probably, not much different from day 214 or day 33. And some of these post-365 days have been harrowing. I suspect this way of talking about our bodies, and the magnificent and difficult sea change that women navigate over many years, was created by medical men as a way to neatly describe a messy and ungovernable thing. As a means of control.
Men have defined the biological realities of female bodies since the dawn of modern medicine and are still working to wrestle the feminine experience into tidy, labeled boxes. They have labeled us “anxious,” “depressed,” or “hysterical.” Most of these men are doctors, but some of them live in your house. Women have absorbed these narratives about themselves, resulting in more anxiety, depression, tearful apologies, and straight-up rage.
There’s a lot of well-earned rage going around these days, but I digress.
The end finds me pondering the journey. I wonder what I’ve lost, and what I’ve gained. What did it cost? I prayed to gods I don’t believe in and offered them my talents for hints of relief. I spent a decade wrestling the inevitable, wrangling the invisible, wringing my hands over a wild ride I did not choose. I lost time. All that time managing my roaring body. I lost confidence — the unshakeable confidence in a body that meets all demands, with a measure of grace and strength.
As a younger woman, I asked unreasonable things of my body and it delivered. The youthful flirtation with ill-advised substances, the late nights drinking. Bad friends and worse boyfriends. The years of pregnancy and nursing. Marriage is a lot. Perimenopause is almost too much.
I gained the surprising ability to say no. I was a yes woman, a midcentury modern pleaser, but there’s no yes when you’re unraveling on the floor. No was a hard lesson for me, but it’s the most valuable thing that came from this turbulent time.
In the end, I also learned this:
Postmenopause isn’t post anything — it’s just more life.
It gets better. There is hope, another side, a new chapter. I would have devoured that message a few years ago, when I thought a certain mad death was knocking on my door. It does get better. I feel calmer, more grounded. Life no longer seems like a constant emergency. Gone, for the most part, is the unspecified anxiety, the undefined panic. I still have occasional hot flashes and wobbly days, my joints hurt and my vision is wonky. The panic is defined and the anxiety is very specific. I’m still me, in other words. But I feel, for lack of a better word, sane. Sane, with rage.
The sane, simmering rage of a modern woman.
🦋
A few other postmenopause benefits:
The stand-off with fertility is over, ending a lifetime of frustration around the fact that women carry the heavier burden when it comes to avoiding pregnancy. I never found a birth control method that wasn’t onerous, though I tried almost everything available. I hope, for the younger females, that male birth control is on the horizon. Sex is great, but the shine is tarnished by all the necessary interference.
I care much less what others think of me. It’s cliché, but also pure truth. When you wash up on a calmer shore, after years of being nearly defeated by your own body, it matters not a whit what you’re wearing or what’s happening with your hair. I am more myself now, and fine with it.
No more blood! I remember how my mother wept, pined for the blood, worried her loss of womanhood. She still, at 80, speaks of how sad she was to lose the cycle. But it cannot be overstated: No. More. Blood. I don’t miss it one bit. No more mess. I’m not driven by tides or lust, moods or moons any more. I bled an ocean and almost drowned — now I rest.
Now that I’m here, on the other side, I want a jumpsuit. Caftans. Clean slates. Space. Functionally Blasé is my new brand. I read a butterfly/menopause analogy somewhere, and have nurtured a heightened awareness of butterflies. The madness of hormonal magical thinking convinced me that, with each butterfly I saw, I was closer to my own metamorphosis. Here I am, and the view is enlightening. Why have I been fighting the wind all this time?
It is an end, but also a beginning. An amorphous unraveling followed, hopefully, by a rebuild. A reweaving of those threads that were so tightly tangled for so long, and a purge of the broken, unnecessary pieces. Beyond midlife, I carry much of what I thought was a burden but is, instead, just a body aging. A body alive. I’ve learned to listen and adjust accordingly, instead of asking unreasonable things. My body is softer, larger, and more of a complainer. But it’s home.
My menopause doesn’t interest me the way it did when I was drowning, but there is so much to share, so many ways we can inform one another’s experience. I’m eager to hear the stories of women’s unraveling and rebuilding. Let the conversation begin.
🌞 🌱
Lisa
“In the end, the real wisdom of menopause may be in questioning how fun or even sane this chore wheel called modern life actually is.” — Sandra Tsing Loh
Things to share:
All the rage: the rise of the menopause novel. My TBR pile just got a lot bigger.
I just read The Guncle by Steven Rowley and note to self: Read books from beach-read lists. What a delight! Warm and funny, with characters you care about and would like to know. More well-written, feel-good, fast-paced beach reads, please. (Also, a beach would be nice.)
I LOVE this essay by
“‘I want more than this,’ they say, the women that I talk to, the ones at a similar stage to me. They need something to change but they’re not sure what it is. They’re unsettled, dissatisfied. They wonder what fulfilment looks like because it wasn’t to be found in raising children and now those children are leaving and they’re moving into a different season where they might have a chance to do something interesting before they’re needed to do childcare all over again. They’re scared of life continuing like this for the next thirty years.”
"But it cannot be overstated: No. More. Blood. I don’t miss it one bit. No more mess. I’m not driven by tides or lust, moods or moons any more. I bled an ocean and almost drowned — now I rest."
THIS!!! SO MUCH THIS!!!
Thank you for this. It’s really important to know that post menopause isn’t post anything — it’s just more life. It’s not an ending really but a beginning. I appreciate all that you share.